France plans to begin talks at the United Nations on a new Security Council resolution to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace prospects, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Friday.

Fabius told reporters at U.N. headquarters in New York that discussions on a text would start "in the coming days."

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani voiced hope Thursday for progress at crunch talks over Iran's nuclear drive, the Kremlin said. 

"Hope was expressed for success at the new round of talks in Lausanne," the Kremlin said in a statement after Rouhani called Putin to discuss the negotiations in Switzerland.

France's public deficit increased by slightly less than expected in 2014, while growth in the eurozone's second biggest economy was confirmed at 0.4 percent, the same as in 2013, the Insee statistics agency said Thursday.

Last year, France's deficit was equivalent to 4.0 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), smaller than the 4.4 percent originally projected, and compared with 4.1 percent in 2013, Insee said in a statement.

The success of the new China-led development bank has caught the United States off guard, after it fought the project and now finds itself increasingly isolated.

Britain, Germany, France... the United States has watched, helpless and dumbfounded, as its European allies flocked to join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, seen as a potential rival to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, both institutions under powerful U. .influence.

Morocco, on guard against attacks like the Tunis museum massacre, prides itself on being a bastion against Islamist extremism with its anti-jihadist "FBI" and training of imams to preach tolerance.

More than 130 "terrorist cells" have been dismantled, 2,720 suspects arrested and 276 plots foiled since 2002, according to Abdelhak Khiame, director of the newly established Central Bureau of Judicial Investigations.

The government of Ebola-hit Guinea on Wednesday urged a dialogue after the three main opposition leaders called for renewed protests against President Alpha Conde over upcoming elections.

"I would like to repeat the government's desire to find ways to restore confidence in the electoral process and to respect the constitution. But especially to preserve social peace," government spokesman Albert Damantang Camara told a press conference.

One of the two pilots on the Germanwings flight that crashed in the French Alps was locked out of the cockpit before the plane went down, killing 150 people, a source close to the investigation told AFP Thursday.

The breakthrough in the investigation, which only increased speculation as to the cause of the disaster, came as bereaved families began arriving from Spain and Germany near the remote mountainous crash site.

French President Francois Hollande will travel to Tunis on Sunday to take part in a "march against terrorism" in the wake of jihadist attacks that killed 21 people, his office said.

"At the invitation of President Beji Caid Essebsi, the president of the republic will go to Tunis for the 'grand republican march against terrorism' organized by the Tunisian authorities," Hollande's Elysee Palace office said in a statement.

A newly married Moroccan couple headed for a new life in Germany were on the doomed Germanwings plane that crashed in the French Alps killing 150 people, a relative said Wednesday.

"Mohamed Ettahrioui, 24, and his bride, Asmaa Ouahoud El Allaoui, 23, were killed" in Tuesday's crash of the Airbus A320 bound from the Spanish city of Barcelona to Duesseldorf in Germany, Abdelhalim al-Boujoufi, a cousin of the groom, told Agence France-Presse.

A summary of what is known so far about the Airbus A320 belonging to German budget airline Germanwings which crashed in the French Alps on Tuesday, killing all 150 people on board.

Flight 4U 9525, took off towards 09:55 am (0855 GMT) from Barcelona in Spain for Duesseldorf in Germany, where it was expected to land at 11:57 am (1057 GMT).